The strikes targeted four compounds run by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan in Orakzai district.

The past week has seen an upsurge in clashes â€“ with at least 80 people dead - as the spring fighting season draws near.

Warplanes and helicopter gunships were involved in the latest round of fighting according to a senior military official in the north-western city of Peshawar.

â€œThe Pakistan Air Force engaged four targets in Sheikhan and Samana Bazar at midnight,â€ he said. â€œMore than 20 militants were killed.â€
He added that a senior local commander, Moin ud Din, may have been killed in the bombing.

The Pakistan Taliban, an umbrella group of armed militias connected with al-Qaeda, is closely linked to the Afghan Taliban.

It has been waging a terrorist war against the government in Islamabad which it accuses of being an American stooge.

Tens of thousands of civilians and thousands more security forces have been killed in suicide attacks.

Pakistan has come under repeated US pressure to clean up militant havens in its territory to prevent cross-border raids against international forces in Afghanistan.

A day earlier dozens of Taliban militants attacked a Pakistani military post in Kurram, another district of the lawless tribal belt that borders Afghanistan.

Eight soldiers were killed and another 15 were wounded, according to a statement released by the military.

The attack centred on a new checkpost set up to close a route used by the Taliban to cross from Kurram into North Waziristan and on towards the Afghan border.